8000-year-old shipyard located off English coast is world’s oldest

The discovery was made at the submerged Mesolithic landscape at Bouldnor Cliff

Marine archaeologists have published stunning images of what they think is an 8000-year-old shipyard located just off the coast of England. They have just found a large number of timber boards that may have once been a platform on the seafloor. Researchers believe that the submerged structure may provide new insights into Stone Age technology and society.

The find was made by divers from the Maritime Archaeology Trust. They made the discovery at the “submerged Mesolithic landscape at Bouldnor Cliff, [which] lies on the edge of the drowned palaeo-valley and is now 11m underwater” according to the  Maritime Archaeology Trust. This location is now located half a mile (1km) east of Yarmouth on the Isle of Wight.

Bouldnor Cliff, is in the Solent Maritime Special Area of Conservation and the zone already has five important archaeological sites. It was once dry land which was densely forested and part of a landmass that connected modern England to the continent. It now lies beneath the body of water known as the Solent, that separates the Isle of Wight from England.

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